


nishinoya wrangling

by desdemona (LydiaOfNarnia)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gen, Minor Injuries, angry saeko, nishinoya sees the face of death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-13
Updated: 2016-12-13
Packaged: 2018-09-08 06:05:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8833273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LydiaOfNarnia/pseuds/desdemona
Summary: “Is there anyone he might listen to?” Anyone capable of putting the fear of God into him, Ukai wanted to say, but bit his tongue. Sawamura seemed to understand anyway.“There is… one person,” he replied, “who might work."





	

“So what if I broke my arm?” Nishinoya hollered, hanging halfway out of the bus window. “I’m still going to play!”

“No,” Ukai said. “No, you’re fucking not.”

To his left, Takeda made a strange half-strangled noise and smacked him on the shoulder. Ukai’s mind flashed back to the (many) lectures he had been given about _“not swearing at students in high school, that’s wrong, that isn’t_ allowed.” Honestly he didn’t see the big deal – it wasn’t like he was a teacher, and he was working with sixteen year olds, not six year olds – but he had the decency to mutter a quick “sorry” under his breath.

Then he turned back to the bus, where a certain libero had stolen the keys _out of his damn hand,_ shut himself in, and now refused to come out. “If you don’t get off the bus in three seconds, _no one_ is going to the tournament, because we’re going to miss it. Move.”

Nishinoya made no move to get off the bus. Instead, he stuck his one working arm out the window, and gave Ukai – of all things – a thumbs down.

“No way, Coach! You’re just going to kick me off!”

 _Yes,_ thought Ukai, _because you busted your arm in a bad receive, and there is no way you can play._ Nishinoya’s stubbornness was something reminiscent of a horror movie monster, and Ukai might have been impressed were he not royally pissed off.

Along the side of the bus, Sawamura loomed. He wasn’t quite tall enough to grasp Nishinoya and pull him out the window, but he looked angry enough that Ukai wondered if he would try anyway. “Nishinoya,” Sawamura growled, every aspect of his “scary captain” mode turned up to eleven, “get off the bus.”

Nishinoya was rightfully terrified. He retreated back inside with a yelp, ducking his body out of view. Only the blond tuft of hair spiked at the top of his head was visible when he called out, “not happening!”

It was a bold move. From the look in Sawamura’s eyes, Ukai doubted Nishinoya would live to see sunset.

Takeda took up the reins of trying to reason with the errant libero while Ukai grabbed Sawamura by the shoulder, tugging him aside. Both aware of the gravitas of this crisis, as well as the fact that they needed to be on the road in twenty minutes, they wore matching incensed expressions.

“Is there anyone he might listen to?” _Anyone capable of putting the fear of God into him,_ Ukai wanted to say, but bit his tongue. Sawamura seemed to understand anyway.

“There is… one person,” he replied, “who might work. Tanaka isn’t going to be happy, though.”

If Ukai cared about the happiness of individual people over his own responsibilities and wellbeing, he would be in a very different place in life right now: namely, married to his high school girlfriend, with two kids already, holding down a respectable job as a librarian or something else just as boring. His mother would be delighted, but Ukai would want to swim out to sea and never be heard from again.

In short, he did not care if the Crown Prince of Japan would be unhappy with whoever Sawamura dragged to fix this. He didn’t care if Nishinoya had to be taken down with an elephant tranquilizer and hauled off the bus by his feet. He had to get his team to this game, and he was going to do it.

“I don’t know who they are,” he told Sawamura sternly, “but get them here now.”

* * *

For a woman just barely breaking 155 centimeters tall, Tanaka Saeko was terrifying.

She had hardly barreled out of her beat up van before she was screaming at the top of her lungs. _“YUU! GET OUT HERE NOW!”_

It was amazing, in a darkly comedic way, how fast Nishinoya sprung to attention. “Nee-san!” he yelped, nearly tumbling from the bus seat he was perched on. As Saeko stalked towards the bus like as assassin on a mission, he didn’t need to be told twice.

To Ukai’s amazement, and slight terror, Nishinoya hastily unlocked the bus doors and stumbled off, right into Saeko’s waiting grip. She did not favor his injured arm at all; in fact, she took advantage of the weakness as she trapped the shorter boy in a headlock.

“What the hell d’you think you’re doin’, huh? You don’t know how to drive! You can’t go to game all by yourself, idiot, why would you lock yourself in the damn bus?”

“I wanted to – ow, _ow,_ stop – go to – Nee-san, my _hair_ – play!”

“With an arm like that? Get real, Yuu!”

Still with Nishinoya in her death grip, Saeko strode over to the assembled teacher, coach, and captain. “Sorry about him!” she chirped, grin in place, as if this whole mess was just one more interesting story to tell to her friends at work later. “If you’ll still let him go, I can drive him up to the game myself – and keep him in the stands, where he _should_ be.”

Facing down Nishinoya’s puppy dog face now was much easier than it had been at the start of the year. Ukai wondered if he was growing an immunity. At his side, Sawamura – who he doubted had ever been affected at all – cleared his throat.

“It’s up to our coach, of course,” he said, glancing at Ukai. “And when Nishinoya is able to get back to practice, he will have hell to pay. But I have no problem with him coming to cheer us on, in the stands.”

Ukai considered this prospect for a moment, debating the merits of making him stay behind to learn a lesson, before he at last nodded. “Fine. In the stands. And once you’re fine again, you’re going to pay for this in sweat.”

Nishinoya gave the authorities a nervous grin. “Laps?” he asked hopefully.

“Flying falls,” Sawamura retorted, bending down to get his “scary face” level with Nishinoya. “ _All_ of the flying falls.”

Nishinoya’s soul seemed to depart from his body. He remained an empty husk as Saeko dragged him all the way back to her car and shoved him in the back seat.

Ukai was more than a little amazed at how smoothly the conflict had been resolved. “Well thought through,” he said to Sawamura, nodding in approval. The captain’s stern expression didn’t change, but quiet pride shone through his eyes.

“Ennoshita could have gotten him out too, but Ennoshita doesn’t have a car.”

Ukai thought getting to ride with a furious Saeko all the way to the game would be punishment enough to keep Nishinoya from ever trying a stunt like this again.


End file.
